completed socks

Here is a picture of socks recently completed, Jacobeans. I gave them as a belated birthday gift to my sister-in-law. She loved them. This was the first time I did a toe up sock. It's not as hard as I thought, however, originally it should have been a short row heel and I just don't care for the short row heel, so I changed to a heel flap that I found from another designer's sock pattern and adapted that to this sock.

Update

Well it's been awhile since I posted on my blog. I finished that college class and decided that being a college student again is something that I'm just not interested in doing right now. I fell the beginning of December and fractured my thoracic 1 and 2 vertebrae. I had to wear a lovely cervical thoracic brace for a good 6 weeks, then a cervical brace for a week, then a soft collar for 2 weeks and then finally weaned from that over the next week. While the bones are healed, my muscles are stiff from having been braced for so long. So now I go to phyical therapy to help with that. I am back at work though with some limitations as to how much I can lift/push/pull for awhile. It's good to be back amongst the living though. It was hard being stuck at home for so long. You might have thought I would do a lot of knitting or crocheting, but it was difficult to do so. I would get too tired holding the work up to eye level as I couldn't see very well down into my lap. So instead, I read quite a few paperback books as I could hold them in alternating hands and didn't need to hold them up so high thanks to aging eyes LOL. I did just recently start knitting a sock. It's toe up, my first time doing so. I'm stuck at the heel though as I really dislike short row heels. I found out about some other heel options and now have to decide which I would like to do. I have this week off from work, so I hope to get some knitting time in. Well, that's the short version update. TTFN

Link for Dragonfly afghan pattern

For those that have asked about where you can get the dragonfly afghan pattern, here is the link: http://www.hassdesign.com/FiletCrochetDesigns/IP/FiletAfghans/

Completed projects

These socks were first completed back in August with a tabi toe so that I could wear them with sandels. I hated them! The toes were not comfortable for me and I've decided I really don't like the feel of the short row heel on homemade socks. I think I much more prefer the heel flap design. So I frogged the toes and redid them with a traditional toe round decrease and gave them to my youngest daughter whose feet are modeling them. She's happy with them and the colorway suits her. I think that is why I chose to use this skein of yarn anyways when I made them. I didn't think I was going to like them and yet it wouldn't have been a waste of time as I knew she'd wear them!

The dragonfly doily is a Hass design I made for my good friend's birthday, though a belated gift it was. She loved it!

Now I need to decide what I would like to make next. I have a couple of ideas. One is to see what the pattern will be in one of the yahoo sock groups that I belong to that will be coming out the start of December. The other project I can't really say because if I go out and buy the yarn for it, it will be a Christmas gift for someone in the family. So, I should know after this weekend what it'll be that I will start working on.

In other news, my college class is almost over. Yeah!!!! I have class this Thursday evening and my final is the following. I've decided not to continue on with more classes as I really don't want to be a student for the next 5+ years to get a BSN which while it might open a few more opportunities in the future, those opportunities will probably want me to go on for my masters! As it is, I found it hard to find time to devote to school when I had so many other things I wanted to or should have been doing. I also found I don't want to take more nursing courses, I'm all ready a nurse! So I'll finish up this course and hopefully get busy with the other projects I've wanted to work on!

It's been over a month?!

I can't believe how fast time flies by. I have 3 more classes left for my college class. So far, I think I'm doing okay. I can't wait for it to be done. I don't like being a student again. The bedroom is almost done. Bought new wall sockets yesterday that I need to figure out how to change and not electrocute myself! I want to change them as the previous owners had painted over them with yellow paint and the room is now blue and I don't want to paint them blue. I've also been battling this cold/sinus thing for awhile now. It just saps my energy. I'm just about done with the belated birthday doily I've been working on. Perhaps I'll finish that up today and block it so I can give it to my friend when I see her Monday evening. Oh well. Off I go.....

I hate painting

Okay, so I've been doing prep work for the last 2 weeks on my son's old room so my youngest daughter can eventually move in there. Today, I decided it was time to prime the ceiling. While the nice swirly, ridged ceiling is nice looking, it is not so nice to have to paint. I'm told, that unless I used a primer like Kilz on it, the paint won't adhere and will drip off the little peaks of the swirl design. Before I could start painting, I needed to wash off the walls from all the paint and drywall repair residue. Did I tell you what a mess these walls were????? I then spent a good hour going around cutting the edges... apparently the room had been blue before the previous owners had painted it yellow. There were some blue spots on the ceiling edges. Then came the fun (not really) of rolling it. There is only 1 window in this room, no air draft, and today is one of those hot, humid, days we have been having in New England. At one point I thought for sure I'd pass out and fall off the ladder. I have paint in my hair, on my skin and hands and in spite of washing it won't all come off. After getting done with the ceiling (hope I didn't miss any spots as it's hard to tell where you painted and where you didn't due to the shadows) I decided to roll primer stuff on the walls especially where the repairs were done and where markings were on the walls that didn't wash off (gotta love boys). I can't believe all the spots I found that were missed when spackling. Okay, I can believe it. The people who originally hung the sheetrock and did the taping in this house did a not so great job. You can see old taping lines. I thought I had fixed most of them, but I didn't. It's so discouraging. I'm exhausted now. I'm debating about painting the ceiling with ceiling paint now or just leaving the white kilz stuff as the "new ceiling". I really don't want to roll that ceiling again. For that matter, I don't really want to paint the walls either. I guess it's just that I'm tired. Eventually, all the rooms in the house need repainting, but as I said before, the original people did a lousy job and there are taping repairs that need to be done is several areas. Things we missed when buying the house as strategically placed furniture does a great job of hiding.... believe me, I know! LOL. I wish it wasn't so expensive to just hire someone to do the job because as I said I hate painting! TTFN

Win free sock yarn!

I would love to win some free sock yarn especially since it's yarn that I've never knit with before! You too and have the opportunity to win, just go to this site http://bellybuttonknits.blogspot.com/ and be sure to leave a comment that you learned about it from me!!!!! Thanks!

I'm going to school

Well, in part due to peer pressure and in part because there's nothing to lose (except my sanity! LOL) I'm going back to school. I'm taking a course called Physical examination and health assessment. It will be the first (maybe last?) course I take towards earning my BSN. I've often thought about doing this, and have researched the possibility a few times, but stopped short when I saw the cost and time involved. For this course, because of a great tuition reimbursement benefit, I don't have to pay for the course and I can submit to another fund for the textbook cost. The professor is coming to my place of work to teach the course. So really, why not? While there are 16 total in the class, 4 of them also work on my nursing unit. We'll be able to help and support each other. The first class was on Thursday. The professor seemed pretty laidback and put us all at ease. I bought my textbook yesterday evening. I only have about 100 pages covering 6 chapters to read by this Thursday! Needless to say, I don't know how much knitting I'll be doing. I did start a crochet thread doily that is intended as a belated birthday present for someone. The only problem there is difficulty seeing the small stitches. The glasses I got at Lenscrafter's I returned as they weren't working right for me after being adjusted twice. I need to get ahold of the eye doctor about the prescription to see what can be done for me so that I don't have to have 2 different pairs of glasses which is what the technician there was saying might be a solution. Come on, get real. I'm a nurse.... I need to see far away, close up and nearby.... I can't keep juggling different eyeglasses every few minutes. So I will call him on Monday and hopefully he'll have a solution to my vision needs. Well, that's about all for now..............